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Monday, October 23

Diverse Characters - V + W

INTRODUCTION:

There’s been a lot of talk about adding diverse characters to fictional books. Most of the time, this is about including people of color if you’re a Caucasian writer, but all writers can add diverse characters to their books. And why stop at race? In this series, I’m going to list all sorts of diverse characters.

Note: I'm not knowledgeable about all types of people, so I'm skipping my usual tips in favor of letting others share their knowledge. See below

**I won't be able to list them all, so here's a list of ethnic groups...with a list of even more lists at the bottom of the page. lol

I think it'd be interesting to read a story about wealthy individuals, especially since there's a lot of fascination with them on TV shows (can you imagine if the Real Housewives shows were about working-class women? It would be a very different show, that's for sure, but no less interesting.). And sometimes it's hard for me to understand wealthy people's mentality, especially since as a teacher, I'll never be rich. That's why it's good to read (and write) stories about people who are different from us; it gives us a chance to understand them better.

I'd add Walloons, a French-speaking ethnic group in Belgium, and West Frisians, a Frisian-speaking ethnic group in The Netherlands.

I've written about vegetarians, vegans, veterans, veterinarians, virgins, and wealthy people. An interesting fact about writing a veterinarian character is that they can provide assistance in an emergency if there aren't any people doctors. My vet student character Yuriy (now graduated with his medical degree) served as a medic in the Canadian Army during WWII. It's not so uncommon for vets and vet students to serve as military medics, and when you're badly injured, you probably don't care if your medic is primarily trained in patients with four legs. On the flip side, some medics trained in people medicine have helped animals wounded in war zones.

This is a hot topic in the YA genre lately. A couple of authors have been publicly shamed for not writing diverse characters. It's crazy. We don't have to be so militant about it. I'm not a fan on injecting a diverse character just to fill a "quota" slot.

It's a shame that a writer is publicly shamed for writing about the characters they want to write about. I believe in diverse characters, but I wouldn't even bash an author who only has Caucasian characters in their books. Most of my published stories right now have Caucasian MCs.

Definitely tried a vampire or story or two. I never really thought of a virgin as a diverse character but I've definitely written about them! It's usually a big deal for a lot of my teenage characters (current WIP definitely not excluded).

You made me smile when you included writers in that group. One thing I get a little tired of is reading a novel where the protagonist is a writer and they're making a living doing it. Those are rare characters.

Nope, vampires and werewolves aren't "diverse" ;) If you knew how many books I've read with them. If we're going for diversity, we need to talk fairies and angels, although I'm seeing a whole lot more of them in urban fantasy fiction nowadays. We've got to look for the lesser known creatures. Maybe djinn?

If I had left out vampires and werewolves, these lists would’ve been shorter, and then someone would’ve commented to added them. But I agree. There are too many stories with vampires and werewolves. Angels and fairies were on my earlier lists. :)

Great list to spark the imagination. How about wheelwrights? I can imagine a story about someone who makes wooden wheels for carriages and dreams of one day being able to get in a carriage himself and traveling far away.

I once wrote about a character that was a virgin, but it wasn't a focal point; just an extra tidbit about the character until he was no longer a virgin. I've also written about a writer, but his love life is the focus.